


We Watched The Stars Together A Lifetime Ago

by TherapistSolarist



Series: Our Time Here Won't End Today [2]
Category: Dream SMP - Fandom, Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Abuse, Canon Compliant, Child Abuse, Dream Team SMP Spoilers, Exiled TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Gaslighting, Gen, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Post-Manberg Festival on Dream Team SMP (Video Blogging RPF), Post-Manberg-Pogtopia War on Dream Team SMP (Video Blogging RPF), References to Depression, Spoilers, anyways onto the real tags, everything else follows canon tho for the most part, except for the fact the family dynamic is kinda wack here still, some of the people here are only mentioned and don't show up, sorry gals guys and non binary pals that wont be till the second fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-27
Updated: 2020-12-27
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:02:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,498
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28350591
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TherapistSolarist/pseuds/TherapistSolarist
Summary: Tommy's been exiled.The days are long and the nights are cold and he misses the people he loves.Dream won't let him go home though so he bides his time and hopes for the best despite the way his heart drops every night.A fic following Tommy's exile....“Now's not your time to die, Tommy.”He didn’t look at Dream as he let his eyes run dry despite the fact he felt like weeping. Instead, he just watched the lava below blankly and scoffed quietly.“It’s never my time to die.”
Relationships: Clay | Dream & Sapnap (Video Blogging RPF), Clay | Dream & TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Clay | Dream & Wilbur Soot, Sapnap & Wilbur Soot, Toby Smith | Tubbo & TommyInnit, Toby Smith | Tubbo & Wilbur Soot, TommyInnit & Phil Watson (Video Blogging RPF), TommyInnit & Sapnap (Video Blogging RPF), TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF) & Wilbur Soot, Wilbur Soot & TommyInnit
Series: Our Time Here Won't End Today [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2076219
Comments: 5
Kudos: 103





	We Watched The Stars Together A Lifetime Ago

**Author's Note:**

> Hellooooooo lovlies! 
> 
> Welcome to the second fic in a series of SBI canon-compliant fics. This touches on the start of Tommy's exile. 
> 
> Love you all! Kudos and comments are appreciated :)

Tommy is exiled on a Sunday. 

The sun had been high in the sky for most of the day but as if the world knows what’s to come for him the rain clouds roll in and the plan he’d made blows up in his face like his home had done months prior. He tries to hide the way he wants to burst into tears and rush forward to meet Tubbo only a few steps away from him. He wants to shake his brother and best friend by the shoulders and beg him to reconsider. He can’t even reach a hand out though before Dream has pulled him back by his own shoulder. He wants to scream and for a moment he resists, pulls himself away from the much older man, and whirls around to face him. He can’t see his face past the infuriating mask that covers his features but he knows the man is smiling. 

He’s got what he wanted after all.

“Goodbye, Tommy.” 

He bites his tongue for once in his life as he turns his head back to look at his brother. 

“Tubbo pleas-” He can’t get the words out before Dream is pushing him forward, a sword at his back poking him close enough to vital organs to make him squirm. It’s unnerving when he looks to his side and sees his dead brother following them smiling. He wonders if Dream will stab him in the back so they match. It’d be fitting if he did.

“Time to go Tommy.” 

“But-please n-“ The jab to his back makes him squirm again and yelp slightly. He takes a step forward and to the edge of the Obsidian wall and drops down before Dream can push him over. He waits quietly as Dream drops down beside him, drawing the sword out again as he prods him forward once again. 

“Come on Tommy, let’s go.” 

“But-but I don’t wanna go-” He hears the small scoff from under the mask and he’s being prodded again by the sword and led out of the mainland that falls under King Eret’s rule. They head for the rivers that lead to the ocean and soon they are in a pair of boats with his brother floating at his side. 

It takes them hours before they reach any semblance of land. It feels like an island in its own right and he knows he is so much further from his home than he’s ever been before. Ghostbur seems elated with the new environment, zipping around and trying to collect supplies to build him a small shelter while Dream watches quietly. They dig a small hole that would have to serve as a shelter in the worsening weather. It’s cramped and cold and he feels claustrophobic the moment he steps into the space and tries to hide in it to wait out the storm.

Before he even gets to hide though, Dream makes him drop his bag of supplies he’d been carrying that day and the armor Techno had given him months prior. The gear had been near indestructible but now he watches as Dream lights a stick of TNT before dropping it directly onto his gear as it blows sky high. He doesn’t say a word when Dream rows away that night and he’d left to curl up in the dirt hole. 

He doesn’t sleep that night and for the first time of many to come he wishes his big brother was still alive and with him right now. Ghostbur’s endless happiness is disturbing when he watches him that night. The brother he had would have been positive, sure, but he knows he’d have been so much angrier too. They’d have stayed awake! Made a plan and huddled together and stayed together for warmth. They’d have taken care of each other like when they were at the start of Pogtopia.

Or maybe Will would have gone crazy all over again.

He misses his brother and cries that night alone in the pit he’s made and tries not to think of how he’s lost yet another brother to the hands of an enemy.

* * *

It takes a month before they have a livable shelter beside the dirt pit. It’s made of wood and not all that comfortable but they have a small house that his brother built for him and he doesn’t ask why he’s stuck around so long to help. He’s afraid he’ll leave him If he does. Instead, he goes out each day and collects supplies and dies a dozen times in ways that don’t matter. 

And every day like clockwork Dream appears in their small little village and makes him destroy all his hard work. He fights back at first but the way the sword cuts his arms and legs and leaves marks he knows will scar within the following months. He stops fighting after a while but not quite yet. He fights back in the ways he can, hides things in the ground and under his tent, finds ways to keep himself from being slaughtered only to slip up and die in a pool of lava again and again. 

They don’t mean anything when you can’t die by someone else’s hands. 

Instead, he tries his best to work through each day despite the bruises and cuts that adorn his body as time wears on. It’s not easy but he tells himself he’ll make it back to L’manburg one day and that he’ll see his brother again and that maybe, just maybe, Tubbo will let him go home.

He does his best to hold out hope but he's not sure he believes in miracles anymore. 

* * *

Tommy finds a portal. 

It’s a month after they finish the shelter but after a bit of searching, he sees the rise of obsidian in the distance and his breath catches as he speeds his pace up, half sprinting to the portal. He found it. He found one! He could- he could go home! He could find a fast way to get into L’manburg and walk past the walls and into the city. He could visit the ice Niki’s flower shop, walk the prime path to his home, step through the door of the white house, and find Tubbo- he could see his friends again. He could see his Tubbo. The thought is nearly overwhelming as he raced through the field coming up short as he approached the portal, panting and almost out of breath when he finally places a hand on the smoothed-out rock. It’s real and he has a portal. Of course, some of it is missing, they never can find fully formed portals around anymore but...but he has one. He has to find more obsidian, he has to go out and go mining and find as many scraps of the rock as he can to repair it. 

He lingers for a second before glancing around the area and making note of the landmarks around him. The field was mostly clear with trees surrounding the portal in a circle almost. He could see the start of a village in the distance but had no real interest in trying to make his way over now. They wouldn’t have what he needed. But it didn’t matter now anyway, he had a goal and if Tommy was known for anything it would be his persistence. He was going to go home no matter what it took.

* * *

Dream finds it. 

It’s devastating when he follows Tommy after he comes up from his mining trip that day. He knows dream sees him stashing the rocks away into his new makeshift bag he’d made with the leather Ghostbur had given him. He doesn’t have to guess what it’s for, no one here is dumb. Especially not Dream. No, he knows the moment he sees the bag gets thrown over his shoulder and he tries to split off from the group. He doesn’t even get that far from him before his name is being called. 

“Oh, Tommy~ you can’t just leave your guests here! Come on back and show us where you're headed!”

Sapnap wasn’t much quieter as he yelled out, “Yeah Tommy come back!” 

“No! Fuck you guys! I’m going on my own and shit! I don’t want you following me or fuckin’ bullying me all the time!” 

It doesn’t do much. 

They follow him anyway and as soon as he’s standing at the portal again, pulling the rocks from his bag and trying to fix it as quickly as possible he feels like crying as he hopes so, so badly that they will work. That the flint and steel in the bottom of the bag will ignite the otherworldly portal and that maybe- just maybe, it’ll be broken in a way it’ll take him right home. 

He can’t place the rocks fast enough though and by the time he finishes he’s scrambling for the flint and steel as Dream, Sapnap and Ghostbur appear from the woods. 

He can’t go now if he doesn’t want to be killed before he gets far so he purses his lips and lights the portal silently as his enemy hovers over him and his dead brother floats into the portal. 

He steps in next and hopes just slightly Dream won’t follow. 

It doesn’t matter though as he steps through and is met with the terrifying drops the underworld provided. The air is hot and dry and he wishes just slightly he’d carried extra water with him to hydrate with but it was too late to turn back now. 

He hears Dreams and Sapnap’s footsteps behind him with the clink of armor accompanying them. 

“It doesn’t connect to the others.”

“Guess not.”

He turned to glance back at the two as Wilbur floated past him.

“Does that mean I can keep it?”

“...sure.” 

He thinks he could test his luck by asking for more. 

“Can I go to the portal hub?”

“As long as you don’t go through the portal to L’Manburg you can.”

That’s all he needs to hear before he turns away and starts to scale the blistering environment. 

They all watch him as he scales the area. No one offers much help as they watch him shift rock around and jump from ledge to ledge trying to get to the portal he knows is going to be close by. 

It’s a while before he interrupts the quiet conversation happening behind him. 

“What happens if I do it anyway.”

  
  


Ghostbur hovers over his left shoulder as he breaks some more of the soft rock in front of him and carves a small path up the ledge. 

“Do what?” 

He ignores Ghostbur’s question and waits for Dream to answer. He knows what he’s been asked. 

“He means what will I do about him trying to use the portal back into L’manburg.” He can hear the eye roll from a mile away as he takes another jump. “It doesn’t matter though because if he does step through that portal I’ll have to kill him for good.”

“His last life?”

“Yeah, his last life.”

“Oh.”

He doesn’t glance at them as he pulls himself up the other edge of the cliff and finally finds himself gazing down the portal he’s been looking for. 

“I found it!” 

He doesn’t even wait to hear the others catch up before he’s sprinting to the bridge leading to the portal. It’s not terribly stable but it holds as he skids to a halt before the small archway into the room. 

“Don’t step into it.”

He grits his teeth as he turns back to face Dream, Sapnap, and Ghostbur. 

“Why not?”

“Like I said I’d have to kill you.”

“But I miss L’manburg.”

“And? You’ve been exiled. You don’t get a choice.”

He blinks away the sudden wave of emotion that threatens to overcome his composure as the tears feel like they are threatening his vision. 

“How about I get a picture, Tommy? I’ll go and find one of the Christmas trees and get one of the city- did you know they put up this really nice....” 

He can’t really hear the rest of the offer but he nods his head as Ghostbur steps through the portal followed by Sapnap and Dream. 

He felt so so close yet still so far still. 

He can’t hear them but he knows the moment they stepped onto the other side they headed for the tree, the big beautiful tree he knew someone wanted to build and make amazing for everyone in L’manburg. 

In L’manburg. 

He feels his throat tighten and his eyes well up slightly as he turns away from the portal and turns to sit and wait. If he keeps staring at the portal he might actually start to cry and then, then they’ll all be even worse to be around than before. He decides to sit by the edge of the bridge that had been built with his back to the portal. It’s precarious, sure, but he didn’t have anything else to do. So instead he sits and waits. And waits. And...and keeps waiting. 

Every moment that passes feels like the knife in his gut is being pushed on more forcefully and instead when he looks down to see the lava, the hellfire, and bare darkness below he for once doesn’t feel scared. Maybe not scared in the same way he should when he peers over the edge, more just a tired acceptance. He was sitting in hell right now. Alone. On a ledge. 

It was a way out.

The thought of the drop made him nearly nauseous before a terrifying calm came over him. Sure it was a long way down but...compare it to dream, to Schlatt to Wilbur, or to anyone else who’d ever hurt him before, it looked inviting. To simply just lean forward and fall, crashing into a fire-laden pit felt like...well it felt like the better option at the moment. So what if he stepped through the portal and was killed? Dream would make him suffer no matter what but...but right now he could just take the swan dive and let it go. He could-

The hand that grabbed him by the back of his neck didn’t startle him. He wanted to ask its owner to push him forward but thought better of it when he was jerked backward by the gloved fingers. 

“Now's not your time to die, Tommy.”

He didn’t look at Dream as he let his eyes run dry despite the fact he felt like weeping. Instead, he just watched the lava below blankly and scoffed quietly. 

“It’s never my time to die.”

He doesn’t protest when Dream hauls him to his feet and pulls him from the edge of the bridge. 

It feels like a death on its own. 

Sure he didn’t pitch himself forward into the bubbling magma below but he sure as hell isn’t fighting back right now. 

It wasn’t a victory but it wasn’t a loss. 

It felt like limbo. 

Maybe that’s what death was supposed to be, the in-between. It sure as hell felt like it when he watched Ghostbur drift across the world. No real goal and no real purpose left behind that he could remember.

He thinks that, maybe, being a ghost wouldn’t be too bad. He could go back to L’manburg and spend time with Tubbo and listen to his discs on the bench and it wouldn’t matter anymore if he was exiled or not because he wouldn’t really be a person anymore. 

Not fully at least. 

It’s not that much longer after Dream has pulled him away from Ghostbur and Sapnap step back through the portal. There’s a small picture held in Ghostbur’s hand and he feels his stomach drop as he’s handed it. He’s slightly terrified Dream will pluck it right from his fingers before he has a chance to truly take it in. But the hand never reaches out for him so he holds the photo close to his heart and tries not to feel the spike of fear and apathy that chokes him every time Dream seems to reach for his direction.

* * *

When he finally makes it back from the portal that night he heads into the small cabin Ghostbur had built him and pulls from it some wool that he spends time turning into a large tarp of sorts and heads to a point outside his own little city. 

He doesn’t want a pity building. 

He doesn’t want a pity log or bell. 

He doesn’t want any of the stupid pity gifts people seem to be sending him. 

He knows deep down that’s what they all are. Why else do they keep coming? He knows he pushed so many of them away and made them angry and just was a bit of an ass, but this? This constant in and out of the people around him was...suffocating in its own way. 

Every night that Ghostbur left him to head back to L’manburg to watch over Fundy or Tubbo or do whatever it is he did. It always feels hollow when he turns away from him at night and heads to his real home. Sure he enjoyed his dead brother’s presence but it didn’t mean he hated the leaving any less. He’d wish they’d just stay the night. 

Just one night. 

But it doesn’t happen so he builds himself a tent for one and places a few blankets Ghostbur had brought back for him and a small pillow he’d gone and stuffed on his own on the first few days out here alone. He sets them under the tent and looks at his work and feels a bit proud of it. 

And then he looks back to his wooden fortress and the smile drops from his face as he stares it down. 

He should be happy, shouldn’t he? He made it ok. He’s doing better now that he’s not trying to survive the night with nothing but dirt to bury himself under. 

He always hated that feeling. You’d feel the dirt pressing into your body and stick in your lungs so that that suffocating feeling stayed with you for weeks on end if you didn’t make the hole big enough. Wilbur, Tubbo, and he had done it a thousand times when things had gone wrong in the early days. 

It feels like a punch to the gut to even remember Tubbo’s name at the moment. He misses him so much and so deeply it makes him want to curl into a ball and cry right then. There’s no one to see him right now. He knows Dream isn’t lurking around a corner like he had been the last few days. It still gave him chills but he knew that he was alone and that he could spare himself the luxury to just sit in his bed and cry softly at the late hour. 

He doesn’t though. 

Instead, all he does is stand and watch as the moon moves over his head and the stars twinkle into patterns that he knows he’ll never fully understand. Techno had loved the stars and the moment feels like it could melt into one of his childhood. Sure he was still a kid in most people’s eyes but by god, he longed for the time’s when he and his family would lay on the grass outside the old farmhouse they lived in. His parents would bring blankets and soft pillows for them to rest their heads on and they’d build a cozy pile in the outdoor world as a family. It started when Phil had told them stories of the stars and later changed to Techno sharing with him the myths of the sky and earth. The greeks he’d told him, it had always been Techno’s favorite. 

He had missed the stars when he and Wilbur had lived in Pogtopia. 

You couldn't see the sky and we're left in the cold and dark of the cave. He couldn’t stand to be in confined cold spaces anymore after the near two and a half years they’d spent underground all the time. When the borders had broken and changed so many months ago to allow both sides to enter “enemy” lines he’d left Pogtopia as often as he could. 

He doubts he’ll ever step foot into the underground city ever again.

He tries to forget about it that night as he tries to make himself smaller under the blankets on the floor of his tent. It’s started to get colder and colder outside. It makes it so much harder to stay warm and asleep at night. It’s also so much harder to wake up every morning and justify getting out of his tent. 

He goes to bed that night cold and upset and missing his family more than before. He doesn’t sleep and when he catches the sunlight through the tents wavering curtains he doesn’t feel hopeful. 

He doesn’t feel anything at all. 

  
  
  
  



End file.
